Covering and Uncovering Flaws

Are you tired of product recommendations yet? Sorry! I have a new one.

I dislike a lot of foundation because, first, it is hard for me to find a good match, and I am extremely picky about how products feel on my face. I want a nice, smooth look, but I don’t want it to feel like I’m wearing a mask. In general, I stick to powder foundations that just even out color and oil, but now and then I want a real foundation.

On a whim, I bought the lightest shade available of the Maybelline Dream Nude Airfoam foundation, and I really like it! It goes on like a mousse, wears light and dry, but is heavy enough that I get real coverage. The color wears pretty true to what is advertised, my skin feels soft without being tacky, or gritty to the touch. I’m going to give it 4.75 out of 5 stars. I’d still like it to be a shade lighter!

It’s acting awards season, and I worked at the SAG Awards viewing party in Dallas, last night. So many pretty dresses. You know what I like? A really good acceptance speech. Jennifer Lawrence is racking up points in that arena for me. I want someone else to write Anne Hathaway’s for her, though.

Of course the focus on Hollywood is timely to the book I am reading. Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, & the Prison of Belief, by Lawrence Wright is turning out to be equal parts interesting, uncomfortable, and horrifying. Interesting because most religions are, and certainly a religion so recently founded that we have megatons of historic evidence both for and against makes this one, and its followers fascinting. Uncomfortable because I recognize so much of my ease into indoctrinated zealotry in how so many of the subjects became Scientologists. Horrifying because of the abuses heaped on the followers, especially the children of congregants.

There isn’t any such thing as a logical religion, so I do my best not to knock beliefs, whether they have to do with giant space clams, invisible patriarchs, or wood elves, and remind myself that people choose religions based on what is a salve to their souls. What bothers me is when people are so cowed by indoctrination that they accept abuse as an integral part of the culture, and are willing to participate in it because it is what their god wants for them to teach them a lesson.

I have a lot of issues with the idea of gods using pain to teach lessons. God is not Chris Brown, though a lot of faithful men and women seem to have battered wife syndrome.